You Gave Me A Song To Sing
by Amerihawk
Summary: When Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes are signed to the same record label with the promise of only keeping after their EP's are released, Steve finds that intense competition and intense romance can actually go hand in hand. Or not.
1. The Way It Is

Chapter 1- The Way It Is

* * *

"So you're saying I wasn't your first choice?"

Steve is angry, maybe irrationally so.

After accepting his first major record deal with Stark Enterprise Records (trademark pending), he had been absolutely ecstatic.

That is, until, he had walked into his first strategy meeting to start recording his first album with the label. He had seven songs written, ready to be recorded, ones that he was really proud of. His confidence in himself, however, had been shot when Tony, his manager, revealed that he wasn't the first choice to be the new signing to the label.

Tony sighed deeply. "Kid, look, you're good. An insane talent, actually. Your guitar skills are second to none and your voice is unlike anything I've ever heard. Your stage presence definitely needs some improvement, though. You don't interact with the fans you have now, so I'm hesitant to promote you so you get more. You need to connect with them more, that's how you sell out stadiums. And _that_ alone is why you were second choice.

"I don't understand why you're even bitter about this, Steve. There was enough room in the budget this year to take on both of you, so this should be a cause for celebration."

Steve scoffed. "Okay, we both know that Pepper, your C.F.O, is allowing you to take on two of us with the added addendum that only one of us can stay on after the release of our debut albums. Don't pretend like this is anything other than what it is."

Tony held his hands up. "There's that fire I saw in you all that time ago. I'm proud of you, kid. If it was completely up to me, you'd be number one in a heartbeat, you know that. But the entire board of directors decided to promote Bucky ahead of you, unfortunately. I was outvoted and that's the only—."

"Wait just a second," Steve glowered at the man in front of him. He knew that Tony would take anything Steve threw at him, for the simple fact that they had been doing it for so long now. Their relationship was entirely professional but it was very relaxed. "I'm being added _behind_ Bucky Barnes! The guy can barely throw two decent lyrics together! I don't understand this one bit! I want a meeting with the board and I want it today."

Tony sighed, softer this time. "Steve, nothing is going to change their minds. He has a bigger online presence. He was nominated for a Teen Choice Award last year and he wasn't even signed! The more awards the company wins, the better we'll be."

"So if I'm not appealing to the masses of eleven year old girls, why keep me on at all?"

Tony sighed. He figured that Steve would react as he was doing. "Because like I said, you're an extraordinary talent. If it were up to me, you would be promoted first, you would have everything you needed. But the board are looking at things from a finance point of view. I mean, kid, you don't even have a Twitter page!"

"So that I can be bombarded with the eleven year old girls telling me that they know where I live? No thank you!" Steve folded his arms.

It wasn't supposed to be like this.

When he was first approached by Tony Stark, he didn't know what to think. The man was known for energy saving protocols and now he had decided he wanted to start a record label and have it compete with RCA and the other major labels? That was practically unheard of. It wasn't uncommon for artists to start their _own_ labels just to distribute their music on their terms, but someone like Tony Stark firing up his creative juices and signing musicians to a fresh label was completely unprecedented. Even though Steve was wary, he had faith in Tony, who had basically been his unofficial manager for the past two years.

Tony's praise for Steve's music was what had got him writing again.

Steve shook his head. He didn't want to think about _that_ right now. He wanted to focus on why tween heartthrob Bucky fucking Barnes was being slotted in ahead of him, given the larger marketing budget, the best slots at award shows, the best everything. The kid was a good vocalist, but his musicianship and lyrics needed a _lot_ of work. Steve felt as though he should be mentoring the kid, even though they were roughly the same age. He rather thought Bucky was only three years younger than him, but behaved like he was seven. He would indulge in the crazy world of social media, something Steve refused to touch.

"So you don't want to connect with your fan base?" Tony inquired. "The people that are buying your music and actively keeping your career alive. You don't want to thank them?"

Steve smirked. He had an already prepared answer to this one. Ever since he had found out that he was being second billed, he had known why. His fan interaction. If there was one thing that kept someone in the limelight, it was the fans. Steve would scoff every single time a fan did something stupid to anyone in the industry. Even Tony had crazed fanboys who would send him the strangest things.

"I thank them by giving them what they keep paying for. The music. I don't want them to buy my albums because they have a crush on me or think my dog is the most adorable thing they've ever seen!" Steve's gestures were becoming mockingly enthusiastic now. "I want them to buy my music because they want to hear my voice. Because they want to listen to me playing my guitar and feel something. Call me old-school, but this industry shouldn't be about tweeting and going live on fucking Periscope! It should be about music, plain and simple."

Tony sighed, holding his hands up. He knew how passionate Steve was about music and just how fired up he could be. "I'm not going to win you over on this, am I?"

"I doubt it."

"Well…that's a shame. I'd love to produce and release your second album, but it looks like you'll be finding somewhere else to do that."

Steve scowled. "You don't think my album will do better?"

Tony smirked quickly. This was the reaction he had been gunning for. "Look at the figures, Steve. You and Bucky Barnes have both released three EP's and are planning your full length albums. Each of his have outsold yours."

"Mine have done better on Metacritic," Steve argued, knowing it was a weak argument to pitch to someone who only really cared about the monetary part of the job.

Tony shrugged. "And I prefer your music, you know this. It's just…not up to me. You would think, as CEO, that it would be up to me, but that's the reason we have a board, to make many voices heard. And the board doesn't like low sales. They'll outvote me again, Steve."

Steve sighed. "So you're saying I make a Twitter account and… _engage_ or I'm out?"

"There seems to be a clear correlation between the fan activity on social media and album sales. Of course, good promotion is a big part and, to get that, you're going to need me bankrolling you."

Tony knew Steve was going to hate what he had to say next more than his last.

"I've asked Bucky to help you get started. You know, initially."

Steve's head was heavy. It was like the words had formed in his brain, but he couldn't quite process them. He felt as though he was being awarded a demerit. Or a Razzie Award. It would be too humiliating to take life lessons from a glorified blogger. Especially when he's your main competition for a coveted record deal at a rich, promising new startup company. People knew that Stark had the money to take anyone anywhere, to any heights. Where Steve longed to go, into musical history where people would study his songs and make biopics about him.

But it looked like Bucky Barnes was headed there first.

Steve wanted to snort. What were the chances of Bucky fucking Barnes ascending to the heights of the greatest artists ever to have lived, as was Steve's goal? _Very_ slim. Only if he transcended his current sound and morphed it into something completely different and then shed his on camera persona, then he might stand a chance. His voice was actually pretty solid, Steve begrudgingly thought. He just focused too much on writing for his teenage fans rather than for himself or somebody important to him. Not that Steve had listened to much of his music. No, of course not.

"You've got to be kidding me."

Tony smirked. "Not kidding. Also, he'll be here in ten minutes. Isn't that fun?"

Steve gritted his teeth. "I'm not going through with this."

In the end, Steve had to go through with this.

He had no choice; it was his career.

So when Bucky Barnes walked through the door, he hadn't expected to actually _like_ him.

* * *

Bucky was wearing a simple outfit; black skinny jeans with a nice grey jumper and some Converse. Simple stuff, but it made him look great. Steve had to actually try not to stare at his thighs. He hadn't expected this, either. He had seen the guy, obviously he knew how attractive Bucky was, but he was usually in control of himself. His eyes were wandering of their own accord this time, however.

Unfortunately, Bucky noticed his leering.

"Uh, do I have something on my face?"

Steve shook his head to clear it and smiled. "No. I was just spacing out for a second there. Sorry about that. I'm Steve. Rogers."

Bucky grinned. "I know, I bought your music."

Steve put on a smirk. "Ah, so you're the one person besides my mom who downloaded it." Bucky laughs easily and Steve wonders why he was so put off about meeting him.

And then Bucky reminds him.

"Hey, congrats on the label stuff. You really deserve it."

Steve knows. He knows he deserves it. His smile fades and his knuckles twitch. He doesn't want to beat up Bucky, but he wants to beat up _something_. Maybe Tony. Or the boneheads in the boardroom.

"Oh…do you not do compliments or something? That's cool, I can be mean."

Steve coughed. "It's not that, I just thought of something else. It's not important. Congrats to you too, man. It's going to fun working with you." Steve wonders if Bucky can sense the falsity of his statement.

"I hope so," Bucky echoes. "So! Mr. Stark said something about your online following? He wanted me to work with you on your social media presence or something?"

Steve nodded wordlessly.

"You have a personal Twitter account right?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, well, it helps to make a separate one. I have my personal account which none of my fans can get to and then I have my public one which I use to communicate with them."

Steve felt the need to be petty. "Oh yeah, how are the eleven year old girls?"

Bucky chuckled. It wasn't the first time he'd been mocked by somebody who thought themselves a more serious artist than he just because of his social standing. Yes, his fan base consisted of a majority of teen girls, but his music reached a lot of other people, too, of all ages in all parts of the world.

Listening to Steve's music, he knew that Steve would be exactly the same as his naysayers. Steve's music was personal, serious and pure _soul_. Bucky's EP was a lot like that, but he wrote electronic pop songs to get himself a platform. He hired co-writers to appeal to the masses and then, once he found his opening, he would release his own music, just him and his piano and maybe a few strings. His fans would buy it, stream it and share it because he made it, but he hoped that they would also enjoy it and open themselves up to something that wasn't as commercial as what they were expecting from him.

He didn't blame Steve for having this perception of him. He understood perfectly. Having a Teen Choice Award really made some reconsider his musicianship. Just because teenagers voted for him didn't make him any less of an artist. He could play piano, guitar and cello competently and could sing and write and compose and produce and none of that was reflected in his public imagine just yet. But it would be.

"They're fine," Bucky chirped pleasantly. "They're not bothering me at the moment, considering it's school hours and all. But I assume they'll be back to hound me in a few hours."

Steve hadn't expected that response. He had expected Bucky to fire back something petulant. Maybe he misjudged the man. It was possible. He'd done it before. With Tony, in fact. "Make sure you encourage them to stay in school."

"Oh, I do," Bucky smiled. Steve pulled out his laptop as they sat down. "Okay, so just make sure that you don't input your location or things get messy. Trust me, I made that mistake."

Steve typed in his details and decided he'd work on his bio later. "Okay. First tweet…can I think of that later?"

Bucky shrugged. "Do whatever you want. You can either get someone from the label to manage for you if you don't want to do it yourself or keep it completely separate from management and do it yourself."

Steve thought about it. It would take away from his time recording and writing, surely, but it might be a good way to get past Bucky and make it into the top spot of the label. "I'll do it. Might be a fun challenge."

"I was hoping you'd say that. Hey, if you want I could tweet your handle and start you off with some followers."

Bucky didn't wait for him to answer before tweeting. _Hey guys! My friend Steve_Rogers finally set up a Twitter! Go follow and download his awesome music! X_

Steve saw the tweet instantly and smiled despite himself. Bucky was not only plugging his music, but also calling him a friend?

Maybe Bucky Barnes wasn't so bad after all.


	2. This Is Who I Am

Chapter 2- This Is Who I Am

* * *

"So," Tony rubbed his hands together as he closed the door behind Steve. "I checked your Twitter followers. You're already on 10,000 and it's only been active for an hour."

Steve shrugged. "Bucky tweeted something, that's probably why. You know I don't care about this. I'll post when I need to, but I'm not doing Q&A and all that other social media shit. I'll drop links to my music and the necessary stuff like tour dates, but I'm not spending all day sat at my phone when I could writing music."

Tony held his hands up. "Hey, I agree with you. I'm just glad you set it up. You don't have to be on it all the time, just try and find a balance. Your fans are going to appreciate you taking the time for them. Social media presences increase album sales. If a fan is feeling appreciated by their idol, they'll buy their music. There's a proven, direct correlation between the two variables."

"Proven by you?" Steve guessed. Tony always had a knack for pretending that things had been said by professionals, when really it was just him.

"Proven by scientists."

"So…you?"

Sighing, Tony threw his hands up in the air. "I don't know what you want me to do here, Steve. There was an issue and I gave you a solution, you followed that advice and now you're still complaining about it. Just work on your presence and don't overthink it. Not that you'd say yes, but you can always ask Bucky if you get stuck. I'm sure he'd still help you."

Steve held his hands up slowly. "Okay, okay, I'm sorry. I'll try to be more upstanding about this whole thing. I'll get Bucky to figure out a plan for me or something. What did you come in here to talk about?"

Tony often did that. He would come in with a purpose and completely get lost in the tangent of whatever logistical idea he came up with on the spot and forget his original point. It would take Steve to bring him back to it.

"Oh, yeah. I have an idea to boost the label's rep and give you and Bucky some nice exposure too. Here it is. We pick an intimate venue, set up a little introductory concert to introduce you both to the label and each other's fans. If your fans become his fans and vice versa, we'll have a more steady influx of sales. It'll really help bring everyone together."

Steve pouted, pondering the idea. "You think? That's actually not a bad idea, though. If it works, it'll really work. I just have to make sure that some of my fans actually make it there and I'm not playing to an arena full of prepubescent girls and their reluctant parents."

"Hey, maybe you'll meet a nice dad and start talking to him," Tony winked.

"Unlikely. I like the sound of that, though. I'll even put the details on Twitter when you have them. Until then, I'll just tease an exciting announcement." Steve sounded bored, but secretly thought it was a good idea.

"That's the spirit. No more whining, okay, Mr. Serious Musician? Now that you've joined us in the twenty-first century, you can become something really special. Just learn how to work the consumers and you're there. Your talent speaks for itself, it really does. Promotion will be really beneficial for you."

"You'd be better right, Tony," Steve warned jokingly. He knew that it wasn't going to harm him, he was just being stubborn for the sake of being stubborn. He was following along with Tony's request and he was gaining followers by the second.

"When am I not, eh? Anyway, I was wondering how you would feel about a little rehearsal? You and Bucky, just playing your songs for each other."

"Sounds like a first date if you ask me."

Tony shrugged. "You could do worse. Both of you could. But no, it's just a chance for you both to get familiar with the other's set list. I'm going to level with you; you're competing for first rights to promotion and payroll, but you're also going to be working closely with each other. I also don't hate the idea of you two recording a duet for your albums. It'll increase both of your fan bases and it'll show people that this studio is one that doesn't pit its stars against each other."

"You mean, the exact thing that you're planning on doing?"

"Well, nobody needs to know that, do they?" Tony pressed a finger to his lips and grinned.

Steve rolled his eyes. "Goodbye, Tony."

Steve ended up in the practise room, tuning his favourite guitar ready for whenever Bucky was going to come along. It turned out that he didn't have to wait long. He was running through some easy scales when he heard a sharp rap on the door. It opened a fraction and Bucky slotted his head through it.

"Okay if I come in?"

Steve placed his hand on the strings, halting the noise that was coming from the guitar and smiled. "Sure, yeah! I was expecting you anyway. I was told that we're doing a run through of our sets for the concert."

"Hence the guitar. Thank god you picked a room with a piano."

"Oh, I forgot that you play. You should really do a piano track on your new record. Show everyone that you can mix it up."

"That'd be cool, actually. I do have some kind of composition that I'm half working on, but it's rough and nowhere near ready to be shown to anybody, let alone featured on my album."

"I'd love to hear it when it's done." When it's about the music, Steve can put any emotions and feelings behind him. He can focus on their mutual love of the art form and nothing else. Or…not a lot else, anyway.

"You'll be the first to know. So, what songs are you planning on doing?"

Steve absently played a chord. "I thought I'd start with a cover from my early YouTube days and then go into two originals and close with a cover."

"Sounds good. Any covers I should stay away from? I wouldn't want to overlap with your set."

"I'm thinking of doing my acoustic cover of _Faith_ and then closing with _Wanna Be Startin' Something_."

Bucky nodded. "Good choices. I love your MJ covers."

"You…you checked out my YouTube channel from years ago?"

Bucky's stoic gaze faltered. "I…was a fan. Before you got signed to your last label. Back when you were just posting them for fun."

Steve wasn't expecting that. For Bucky to have been a fan before this whole thing or even before he had released anything properly. He wasn't even on Spotify back then and Bucky was a fan of his music. And here he was shitting on him for appealing to a younger demographic of fans? That really wasn't cool of him, if he was being introspectively honest.

"You were? I gotta say, that's mighty awesome. I didn't even know people listened to those apart from my core fan base."

Bucky said nothing and blushed.

"Oh my god. Just how deep does this go, Mr. Barnes?" Something inside Steve really liked the sound of that particular moniker.

Bucky muttered something that sounded an awful lot like "Notification squad."

Steve stared at him, open-mouthed. " _Notification squad_! That's like…the craziest of the crazy."

"I was young and you were _good_ and…my friend showed you to me, okay? Come to think of it, she doesn't even know you're also at this label. Man, she would _freak_ if she knew that I knew you."

"Bring her to the show. Anything for my notification squad." Steve bumped Bucky on the arm. "Wait, does this mean you're a fanboy?"

"I am an award-winning musician, I do _not_ have time for fanboy culture."

"Notification squad," Steve whispered. "How the tables have turned though. Look at where you are now. _You_ have a notification squad."

Bucky blushed. "I…I guess I do, don't I?"

"Face it, Buck. You've made it to the big times, now. I mean, you're doing a show with YouTube _sensation_ , Steve Rogers."

"Hush yourself. Sing something."

"Those are oxymoronic sentences."

"You know what I mean."

Steve nodded, smiling fading slowly from his face. I guess I'll just go through a new song and go from there."

Bucky nodded, eager to hear what new material Steve had up his sleeve. He'd always known that Steve Rogers was a multi-faceted artist; a talented singer, writer, composer, producer, player, everything that he needed to build a career. And now he had his online following which was steadily swelling. Bucky didn't want to admit how long he'd been a fan for.

Steve prepped his guitar, strummed a few notes before tapping his foot and beginning a peculiar melody that Bucky admitted would only really work with Steve's unique tone. It was bordering on a folk/rock sound, something which Steve hadn't delved into before, at least publically.

" _Turn your heart to stone before you look him in the eyes…"_ Steve crooned, drifting off into his melody. Bucky could tell how much he really _felt_ it, every word he sang, every note he played. All of it.

"It needs rewriting in places, especially the second verse, but what'd you think so far?"

Bucky took a second, to truly come back from the place where Steve had taken him with the music, the lyrics, his musicality, everything. "It was beautiful. I love the lyrics, you always play well but this was pure passion. I can tell that means something to you."

"Thanks, yeah it does. I like to personalise my music, but this took me to a place I hadn't explored yet. I'm glad I did."

"That's gonna be tough to follow."

"It might be if it was anybody else but you singing. I've heard you, Buck, you can really sing. Just let go of yourself and feel everything you sing."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean…just forget that you're performing _for_ people and just think of it as opening up to _yourself_. What I do is to just pretend that all of that faces you're singing to are _yours_. Tell yourself the story you've been afraid to say out loud. The best music comes from the scariest places."

Bucky whistled appreciatively. "You're only a few years older than me but you talk about music like you've been around for decades."

"I guess I just have an old soul. Anyway, enough about me, get singing, Barnes."

Bucky frowned, hesitated and shuffled over to the piano. Steve was shocked but silently applauded the decision. He didn't say anything for fear of startling the other man, but he was glad that Bucky was throwing away any forethought and just singing and playing for himself."

Like Steve, Bucky tinkled a few ivories before pressing his foot on the pedal and playing a gentle chord. Steve was intrigued.

" _You waited for my kingdom to fall to the ground. I fell with it, didn't make no sound,_ " Bucky sang in a harsh yet lullaby-like whisper. For lyrics that seemed so bitter, Bucky's admittedly angelic voice made it sound like he was heaping praise onto this unknown person. It was a wonder anybody ever thought Bucky might be mad at them.

As the chord progression took its place, Steve found himself seeing Bucky in a completely different light.

Gone was the seemingly shallow, social media-obsessed goon that Steve had pegged him as. Gone with the naïve TCA winner. Steve could only see a _musician_ , somebody who had a real gift and a connection with the music he was playing. It was something to behold, something to talk about. There was no doubt this was an original, because nobody else could have sang it. Steve prayed that, when released, nobody even thought about covering this song because there would be no way that they could. The words were written to flow from Bucky's lips only, the melody was made for his fingers to traverse. It was magic.

Steve felt a shiver run through him and realised the power of music, right there and then. He knew an approximate, but he understood now that music was a passage into somebody's true sense of self. No matter who they wanted to show to the world, music would always reveal them in an impartial light. Nobody could take musical identity away, nobody could copy it. It was so intensely personal that Steve almost felt as though he shouldn't be privy to such a moment.

Bucky let the last two bars die in a tragic diminuendo that collided with its cadence in such a brutal way that Steve felt personally afflicted by the music stopping.

"Please tell me that wasn't the half-worked-on piano composition you were talking about?"

Bucky's face paled. "That bad?"

"Bad? Are you _kidding_ me? If that's half worked on, I may as well give up now. That was something else, Bucky. I've never heard music like that live before."

"Oh…wow, thanks. That means so much to me. I…uh…don't suppose, it's just an idea, but do you maybe want to _do it_? With me? It might be pretty great."

Steve blinked at what he heard. He figured it wasn't entirely unwelcome, but it was just so out of the blue, especially from someone as reserved as Bucky. "What?"

Bucky laughed brightly. "A _duet_ , Steve. For the concert. I figure it'll go down well. Mr. Stark suggested something along the lines of that for our albums, but we could give everyone a little taste of what to expect when we actually do it. You can say no, I just thought that it might be nice."

"Oh, I'm on board. After what I just heard, there's no way you're going to get away from this _without_ singing with me."

"I look forward to it. We could arrange a new cover, we have like two weeks until the concert. Shit, I'm supposed to promote it on Twitter, aren't I?"

"Don't worry about that. Hand me your phone."

Steve passed over the device and Bucky smiled at the lock screen picture. It was Steve and his dog, Rocky.

"Who's this little guy?"

"That's Rocky, a complete nightmare but the greatest thing in the world."

"He's adorable. Okay, so…" Bucky began to type something before handing the phone back to Steve, who refreshed the feed.

 _Got something exciting planned, details to come soon, you won't want to miss it ;)_

Steve chuckled at how cryptic it was. "You think that'll get people interested?"

"Rogers, you've already got a notification squad. Again. And I'm not one of them this time, it's all adoring fans who are going to be fighting each other for tickets to this when you release them. I'm predicting several wars from now until then."

"How do you do all of this? I mean, I'm not a grandfather, I can use technology, I just don't know how to word things and interact in a way that doesn't seem stupid."

"Oh, it's all stupid," Bucky countered. "Come on, people getting alerts on their phones whenever you type 140 characters or less into a box? It's crazy. And seeing the things that people tweet to their idols, begging for them to click a button and like one of their tweets? That's even crazier. Sometimes it makes their entire day when they see that notification come up. They'll hold onto it for life, tell everyone they meet that such and such a celebrity once liked their tweet that was just "Please like this tweet, it would mean so much I love you". If that's not stupid, I don't know what is.

"But we do it for ourselves, really. And for the fans, I guess, I think it's nice for them to know that they're appreciated, but there are other ways to do that. I left an acknowledgement in the booklet of my EP. But we do it because it's an easy way to sell records. You tweet an iTunes link to your album, it'll get retweeted, it might even trend. It can potentially reach almost every active user in the entire world. As much as people say they're sitting tweeting to give love to the fans, it's mostly just self-serving consumer manipulation."

Steve fell silent.

"Or something like that," Bucky grinned.

"You are the weirdest," Steve commented.

"And now you're stuck with me. Notification squad for _life_!"

Steve punched Bucky's arm lightly and chuckled.

Bucky sighed fondly. He didn't know whether Steve also felt that tense crackle of electricity lingering in the air, waiting to snap like lightning, but he most certainly did. Whether it stemmed from his long time crush on YouTube singer Steve Rogers or the way in which he was promised with several close-quarters encounters with the man. He didn't know what was causing it.

All he knew was how he felt in that moment.


End file.
